Interaction designer Pietro Leoni, of curator Joseph Grima’s Genova-based collective Space Caviar, programmed twelve Roomba vacuum cleaners to follow a routine created with choreographer Kostas Tsioukas.
Leoni hacked the robots, removing their cleaning equipment and changing their wiring, to make them perform a specific set of movement instructions to classical music piece The Blue Danube by Austrian composer Johann Strauss.
Six “male” and six “female” robots dance in couples to mimic a Viennese Waltz, with three pairs performing before three more.
The movements are designed to emulate the basic three-step rhythm typical of this dance. “To calculate the rhythm with the robots, we had to use distance to mark ‘one, two, three’ to make the choreography,” Tsioukas told Dezeen.
After the first couples finish, they move towards the back of the space so the rest of the dancers can take the stage.
Although programmed to act out exactly the same choreography each time, the shows occasionally have variations as external factors affect the “sensitive” robots.
“They’re quite accurate but also they make some mistakes,” added Leoni. “We think robots are really disciplined but sometimes they’re not at all. They bump into each other, some of them don’t start.” ….
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Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!